Classic Saturday Night Live Thread

Discussion in 'Visual Arts' started by MikaelaArsenault, Jun 20, 2020.

  1. MekkaGodzilla

    MekkaGodzilla Forum Resident

    Location:
    Westerville, Ohio
    You sure that wasn't Candy Bergen?
     
  2. JediJones

    JediJones Forum Resident

    Location:
    Pennsylvania
    They both did it. It was a recurring sketch that also happened when Bergen wasn't hosting the show. I remember the one with dangerous Halloween costumes (human torch). Wiki says this about him:

    Recurring Saturday Night Live characters and sketches introduced 1976–77 - Wikipedia

    Irwin Mainway

    A Dan Aykroyd character, this maker of dangerous toys was repeatedly interrogated by the hosts of "Consumer Probe" and "On The Spot" during seasons two, three, and four.

    Aykroyd would later appear as Mainway on an episode of the 90s sketch Bill Swerski's Superfans, presenting Michael Jordan merchandising which was also dangerous. Mainway was revealed in this sketch to be a cousin of Todd O'Conner, Chris Farley's character. He would also appear in a Judge Judy sketch.

    Also got this list of appearances from searching mainway on Saturday Net:
    76j Candice Bergen / Frank Zappa
    show: Consumer Probe- Irwin Mainway (DAA) defends some unsafe children's toys
    77d Charles Grodin / Paul Simon
    show: Consumer Probe- Irwin Mainway promotes some unsafe Halloween costumes
    78b Fred Willard / Devo
    show: On The Spot- school lunch provider Irwin Mainway rebuts nutrition worries
    78h Eric Idle / Kate Bush
    show: Consumer Probe- Irwin Mainway's endangered species fashions displayed
    78q Milton Berle / Ornette Coleman & Prime Time
    show: On The Spot- Irwin Mainway's unsafe Kiddie Funworld ires Joan Face (JAC)
    94p John Goodman / The Tragically Hip
    show: Irwin Mainway & Super Fans on Michael Jordan return; Brian Dennehy cameo
    97l John Goodman / Paula Cole
    show Judge Judy (CHO)- (ANG) claims that Irwin Mainway's toys are dangerous

    That was kind of the point. Norm was the only TV comedian I've ever seen who was able to do Letterman as well as Letterman did Letterman. He was an anti-comedy comedian. Someone whose act was deconstructive. And that's what made him brilliant and hilarious on SNL. I also remember thinking Colin Quinn was pretty good on SNL, but don't think I watched many episodes with him.
     
    Last edited: Apr 30, 2021
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  3. Scowl

    Scowl Forum Resident

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    I'm up to season 12 on Peacock's SNL. Although the episodes are now 45 minutes long, I'm still shocked at the sketches they chose not to include. For example when Rosanna Arquette hosted, how could they not include the People's Court sketch where the two white trash women sue the Devil? Instead they included the humorless short by Jim Jarmusch that was so dull I can't even remember what it was called or what it was about.
     
    Last edited: Apr 30, 2021
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  4. swandown

    swandown Under Assistant West Coast Forum Resident

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    Portland, OR
    One of the best sketches of the late '80s!!

    "I am...a barfly."

     
  5. czeskleba

    czeskleba Senior Member

    Location:
    Seattle
    I'm pretty sure none of the edits are being done based on aesthetic judgment. Whatever gets cut, there presumably is some reason related to rights, clearances, copyrights, or something. So it's not a case of them choosing not to include certain sketches, or choosing some sketches over others.
     
    Last edited: May 2, 2021
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  6. JediJones

    JediJones Forum Resident

    Location:
    Pennsylvania
    Some people said on Reddit some of these "episodes" are only 15 minutes long. Also note that a lot of the SNL reruns, even the ones NBC themselves would play as "classic episodes" were reconfigured from original broadcast. Sketches were sometimes placed in a different order and were sometimes replaced with "rehearsal" versions of the sketches. Possibly because lines were flubbed on the live episode or, for some other reason, they preferred the rehearsal version creatively. So people seem to think there are reasons besides only rights issues that are leaving these episodes in the state they're in. The producers may see putting together an SNL rerun as needing a lot of editorial work, and that work maybe hasn't been done for a lot of episodes.
     
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  7. modrevolve

    modrevolve Forum Resident

    The first season of SNL where the dress rehearsals were taped was Season 11 - Lorne’s first year back. Those reruns are severely edited to intersperse a lot or miscues, flubbed lines, dead air or sometimes replaced entirely with the dress rehearsals.
    There are very through breakdowns here.
    SNL Review index — Bronwyn Douwsma

    In most cases the sketches from Peacock are removed due to rights issues. But i do think in some cases they have been removed because they are so flat our terrible. I was watching the Robert Culp episode from Season 7 on Peacock. An over ten minute sketch where the cast are on a submarine and Culp is dressed in drag has been removed because its so painful to watch.
     
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  8. Scowl

    Scowl Forum Resident

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    I would love to know the rights, clearances, and copyrights that prevented them from including the hilarious People's Court sketch yet allowed them to include Jim Jarmusch's deadly unfunny short.
     
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  9. Scowl

    Scowl Forum Resident

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    Yet some of the good ones were not included, especially in season six.
     
  10. modrevolve

    modrevolve Forum Resident

    I did not realize the theme for the sketch “what’s it all about” was taken from a real song until Peacock removed it lol.
     
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  11. czeskleba

    czeskleba Senior Member

    Location:
    Seattle
    I have no idea what the rights issues might be. But there really is no other plausible explanation. They clearly aren't cutting the shows to get them down to any particular length, since the length of the cut episodes varies so widely. It seems pretty unlikely that they would go to the time and expense of randomly cutting the shows for quality reasons for a platform like this. And if for some reason they were cutting for quality (ie, trying to prune out the bad sketches) why would they hire an idiot with clearly poor judgment to make those cutting decisions? Unless you can suggest a plausible alternative, rights issues seem to be the only possible reason for the cuts.
    Yet a lot of other equally bad sketches have been left in. Why would they cut bad sketches sometimes but not others? As I noted above, it seems unlikely they'd go to the time and expense of trying to prune for quality on a platform like this, where length is not an issue.
     
  12. Scowl

    Scowl Forum Resident

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    I think with over forty seasons to edit, they don't have to be too picky about what they do to every single episode. I doubt many people are going to complain to Peacock about them cutting out a great sketch that people remember seeing decades ago.

    I can't tell you how many times in my life I've seen idiots with clearly poor judgement get hired with no explanation.

    The remotest thing I can think of is that maybe the sketch used the theme music from People's Court and that's why they decided to toss it. I must have seen this sketch a dozen times when Comedy Central ran the episode.
     
  13. modrevolve

    modrevolve Forum Resident

    The Ron Howard episode from includes the often celebrated Focus On Film sketch where Eddie Murphy gets the crowd to chant “Opie Cunningham” and attempts to shave his mustache. Again gone for no reason I can think of.
     
  14. czeskleba

    czeskleba Senior Member

    Location:
    Seattle
    On the flipside, why would they cut something if they didn't have to? It's not a case of them worrying about taking up too much space on a physical medium, nor is it a case of needing to fit into a specific time slot. With streaming, neither of those things matter. It's cheaper and easier not to cut something than to cut it, and (with commercial time being a consideration) longer episodes are better than shorter ones from a financial standpoint.

    If they needed to get each episode down to say, exactly 45 minutes for some reason, I can see them hiring an idiot who made stupid cutting choices (or made choices based on length rather than sketch quality). But that isn't the case here. It seems highly unlikely they would want to try to cut the episodes for quality for this platform, and even less likely that if they did, they'd for some reason happen to hire an idiot with no judgment to make those cuts. The erratic nature of the cuts (both in terms of the amount of cutting per episode and quality of what is cut) argue strongly against quality being a factor in the cutting decisions.

    That could be it. Again, I can't think of any plausible reason aside from legal/rights issues for that particular cut.
     
  15. czeskleba

    czeskleba Senior Member

    Location:
    Seattle
    Just because we can't think of the reason doesn't mean there isn't one. There doesn't seem to be any plausible reason for cutting any sketch aside from legal/rights issues of some sort.
     
  16. MarkTheShark

    MarkTheShark Senior Member

    I remember watching it when it aired. Unfortunately, I don't remember what was included other than that it was all stuff from the current SNL with that year's cast, so likely all or mostly all from the then-current season.

    It was like "The Best Of Saturday Night Live" that aired during the 1979-80 season, only featuring the "new" cast. (The 1979-80 series was preceded by a special or two in 1978-79; I wonder if they were hoping this would also lead to a regular "Best Of" series for the "new" version of SNL -- in any case, it didn't.)

    Speaking of which, as far as I know those (network) "Best Of SNL" shows (not to be confused with later syndicated "best of" shows) were only aired once and that was it. I wonder if they were archived and might still exist?
     
    Last edited: May 2, 2021
  17. JediJones

    JediJones Forum Resident

    Location:
    Pennsylvania
    I believe to a large degree, the SNL sketches NBC.com used to let you watch for free as individual sketches (but also navigable by episode) were just stitched together and copied over to Peacock. I don't think a ton of work was put into putting together the content for NBC.com. I think it was just meant to give a sampling of SNL, possibly with the idea that it would get you to watch the show or buy some DVDs. And it's clear that Peacock was its own large undertaking, and was not timed so that a bunch of newly available SNL content would be ready for its debut. I also think I saw someone get some e-mail from Peacock support saying more content would be added over time. So I'll reiterate that I think a lot of the reason content is missing is that the work simply hasn't been done to screen through every sketch, check them for rights issues, make decisions on editing with respect to dress rehearsals and get them converted to the right format for posting on the internet. What we're seeing is largely a port of NBC.com's content which was probably only intermittently worked on over the years, in conjunction with clips being posted on their YouTube channel.

    Incidentally, there are SNL YouTube playlists with many official SNL videos marked as "not available in your country." The playlists allow you to see the video thumbnail and name and that message, but not let you play that video.
     
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  18. Scowl

    Scowl Forum Resident

    Location:
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    I guess because someone didn't like it or someone thought viewers wouldn't like it. Perhaps the edits were selected by a committee and any objection would throw a sketch out. That would explain why some season six episodes are as short as twenty minutes long.

    Some of the painfully mediocre sketches that did make the cut make me wonder about the selection process they followed.
     
  19. czeskleba

    czeskleba Senior Member

    Location:
    Seattle
    Yeah, and like I've said, that's the very reason I don't believe there was a selection process as such.

    For a streaming platform, I can't believe they would take the time and expense to hire someone (much less a committee) to go through the episodes and evaluate them for quality. And it doesn't make sense to do that from a financial standpoint, because longer episodes equal more commercials, so cutting them down costs money that way too. I think @JediJones is right that this whole thing was just done quick and dirty with minimal effort. If a sketch is missing, it's likely for legal reasons, or perhaps laziness in terms of assembling materials in the manner jedi describes. I can't believe any sketch was cut on the basis of someone simply not liking it.
     
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  20. Scowl

    Scowl Forum Resident

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    When streaming old shows, most people will just go on to the next episode until they get tired of watching. You're not going to run out of SNL episodes to watch on Peacock.
     
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  21. tonyballz

    tonyballz Roogalator

    Location:
    arizona
    Episode #117, 2/21/81, from the show's wretched 6th season:
    Musical guest Todd Rundgren performed two songs, but then in the last ten minutes of the show the relatively unknown Prince and his band play Partyup and it's a mother. It sounds like Prince sneaks in the F-word on the second verse. Immediately afterward the cast gather onstage for the traditional goodbye before the closing credits. Cast member Charles Rocket distinctly and on purpose says the F-word, which got him fired. Shortly after this episode, Lorne Michaels returned and canned the entire cast except for Joe Piscopo and Eddie Murphy.

    Keep in mind that Prince is not wearing pants in this clip. The F-word is around 1:14. Hurry up and watch this before NBC takes it down again.



    And now, the late Mr. Charles Rocket getting himself fired:

    https://youtu.be/9CFIMaZVPIk
     
  22. Matthew Tate

    Matthew Tate Forum Resident

    Location:
    Richmond, Virginia

    charles rocket was still there the next week, hmmm.....
     
  23. Squealy

    Squealy Forum Hall Of Fame

    Location:
    Vancouver
    Lorne didn’t return to SNL until season 10, four years later.
     
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  24. Matthew Tate

    Matthew Tate Forum Resident

    Location:
    Richmond, Virginia

    yeah i thought dick ebersol canned them all
     
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  25. tonyballz

    tonyballz Roogalator

    Location:
    arizona
    Last edited: May 2, 2021
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